The Metropolitan Transportation Authority will ax L train service in most of Brooklyn and all of Manhattan this weekend from Sept. 13–16.
Transit honchos are suspending service between Broadway Junction in East New York and Eighth Avenue in Manhattan starting at 10:45 p.m. Friday to accommodate upgrades to an escalator at the Union Square station across the river, and service won’t resume until 5 a.m. Monday.
The improvements to the Manhattan station are part of accessibility improvements transit honchos promised during the original L-train shutdown plan, according to a senior official, who said the weekend shutdown is not a symptom of repairs to the inter-borough Canarsie Tunnel that was severely damaged during Superstorm Sandy.
“While the L Project was initiated because of the damage from Superstorm Sandy, it was designed to address many other critical needs — namely, accessibility,” said New York City Transit’s Senior Adviser for System-Wide Accessibility Alex Elegudin. “Advancing this work now at these critical stations as we had promised will help to minimize disruptions later while also getting the accessibility and ease-of-access improvements done as quickly as possible, a huge win for our customers.”
The authority will roll out two free shuttle buses in Brooklyn during the closure, including one that will run from the Lorimer Street L train stop to the Marcy Avenue and Hewes Street J and M train stops, and another shuttle that will run from Lorimer Street to Broadway Junction, and also stop at Marcy Avenue, according to the agency.
The transit authority will enhance service along the G line, which will run every 8 minutes instead of every 10 minutes during the day, and they advise riders to also use the M train as an alternative.
For a station-by-station breakdown of alternative options, check out the agency’s service changes page.
In addition to the cross-borough closure, the L train will stop running in Brooklyn between Lorimer Street and Broadway Junction at weeknights from midnight Fridays to 5 a.m. Mondays from Sept. 23-27 and Sept. 30-Oct. 4 and throughout the following weekends of Sept. 27-29 and Oct. 4-6.
There will be two free shuttle buses with one running between Broadway Junction and Myrtle Avenue-Wyckoff Street, and another between Myrtle Avenue-Wyckoff Street and Lorimer Street, according to the agency.
The weekend closures will come back in the new year, with no service during all weekends in January 2020, the agency said.
